Soul-Building

One's character is the effect of soul-building. It may be either a temple or a prison. This is a matter of choice for each soul, and upon the quality of material selected will depend the strength or weakness of character. We cannot pluck figs from thistles. But by desire and action can be builded an impregnable wall—so builded that it will contract and close in upon us, thus peradventure we lose the conscious product of a life's work. But, if we have builded a temple, the character will be infinitely unfolded though such largeness of purpose, that in the ultimate the magnificence and beauty of the soul will be typified in the physical life. Is it not wise that in knowing this we seek to build for ourselves a temple and not a prison?

—The Essene

It is the soul that creates to itself a body, the idea which makes to itself a habitation.—Mazzini

Knowledge is happiness, because to have knowledge—broad, deep knowledge—is to know true ends from false, and lofty things from low.To know the thoughts and deeds that have marked man's progress is to feel the great heart-throbs of humanity though the centuries; and if one does not feel in these pulsations a heavenward striving, one must indeed be deaf to the harmonies of life.—Helen Keller